Craig Perry
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caperry.bsky.social
Craig Perry
@caperry.bsky.social
1K followers 950 following 120 posts
Teacher-scholar at the intersection of World History, Jewish Studies, and Islamic Civilizations Studies. New book in 2026: https://bit.ly/PerrySlavery. Co-editor: The Cambridge World History of Slavery vol. 2: https://bit.ly/CWHS2
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Reposted by Craig Perry
williamcarruthers.bsky.social
The first paperback copy of my book Flooded Pasts: UNESCO, Nubia, and the Recolonization of Archaeology just arrived! Available on the 15th March from @cornellupress.bsky.social: www.cornellpress.cornell.edu/book/9781501...
Flooded Pasts front cover Flooded Pasts back cover
January 21, 2026 at 11:34 AM
Reposted by Craig Perry
caperry.bsky.social
Happy North America publication day to Slavery & the Jews of Medieval Egypt! I'll be giving talks this Winter and Spring in Atlanta, Columbia (SC), Urbana-Champaign, and Boston. And I'll be Zooming in to some seminars to discuss the work with students. I'm very happy to share this work with you!
princetonupress.bsky.social Princeton University Press @princetonupress.bsky.social · 22d
Slavery and the Jews of Medieval Egypt by @caperry.bsky.social is a new global #history of the slave trade, the lives of enslaved people, & the role of slavery in the formation of Jewish & Arab-Islamic culture in the medieval Middle East.

Out now (17 Mar UK pub): press.princeton.edu/books/hardco...
Slavery and the Jews of Medieval Egypt: A History by Craig Perry
January 20, 2026 at 9:39 PM
caperry.bsky.social
Happy North America publication day to Slavery & the Jews of Medieval Egypt! I'll be giving talks this Winter and Spring in Atlanta, Columbia (SC), Urbana-Champaign, and Boston. And I'll be Zooming in to some seminars to discuss the work with students. I'm very happy to share this work with you!
princetonupress.bsky.social Princeton University Press @princetonupress.bsky.social · 22d
Slavery and the Jews of Medieval Egypt by @caperry.bsky.social is a new global #history of the slave trade, the lives of enslaved people, & the role of slavery in the formation of Jewish & Arab-Islamic culture in the medieval Middle East.

Out now (17 Mar UK pub): press.princeton.edu/books/hardco...
Slavery and the Jews of Medieval Egypt: A History by Craig Perry
January 20, 2026 at 9:39 PM
Reposted by Craig Perry
princetonupress.bsky.social
Slavery and the Jews of Medieval Egypt by @caperry.bsky.social is a new global #history of the slave trade, the lives of enslaved people, & the role of slavery in the formation of Jewish & Arab-Islamic culture in the medieval Middle East.

Out now (17 Mar UK pub): press.princeton.edu/books/hardco...
Slavery and the Jews of Medieval Egypt: A History by Craig Perry
January 20, 2026 at 7:03 PM
Reposted by Craig Perry
moudhy.bsky.social
You may have heard of Enheduanna, the princess, priestess, and poet who is also the earliest named author in history.

Well, a tiny broken artefact made of lapis lazuli preserves the name of Ilum-pālil, her hairdresser. It is a fragmentary cylinder seal, excavated from a tomb in the city of Ur.
Photo of a blue lapis lazuli cylinder seal that is broken, shown from two sides. On the left it looks almost complete, like a cylinder that has a chip at the bottom left. Part of a cuneiform inscription is visible on the left side. On the right of the image is the other side which is more broken, just a fragment. Part of the image of a person is visible.
January 13, 2026 at 2:23 PM
Reposted by Craig Perry
arashzeini.com
One of the strong points of the HOPWAG series is Adamson's accessible writing style. It is good to have 'All Ten Rules for Writing about the History of Philosophy' in one place. Useful as they are for students, I suspect they will find application beyond #history and #philosophy 👇🏻
January 12, 2026 at 12:58 PM
Reposted by Craig Perry
caperry.bsky.social
First spotting of my book in the wild! At at Labyrinth Books in Princeton, NJ. With thanks to Athina Pfeiffer for the photo. Official publication day is January 20 in the US. March 17 in the uK. www.bit.ly/PerrySlavery
Photograph of a shelf in a bookstore showing Craig Perry's Slavery and the Jews of Medieval Egypt.
January 8, 2026 at 4:41 PM
caperry.bsky.social
First spotting of my book in the wild! At at Labyrinth Books in Princeton, NJ. With thanks to Athina Pfeiffer for the photo. Official publication day is January 20 in the US. March 17 in the uK. www.bit.ly/PerrySlavery
Photograph of a shelf in a bookstore showing Craig Perry's Slavery and the Jews of Medieval Egypt.
January 8, 2026 at 4:41 PM
Reposted by Craig Perry
abesilbe.bsky.social
I am now a host on the Jewish Studies channel for @newbooksnetwork.bsky.social. If you have a forthcoming Jewish Studies title (or even within the last year or two) and have not yet done an NBN interview, please get in touch!
January 3, 2026 at 4:30 PM
Reposted by Craig Perry
lollardfish.bsky.social
I can't see the OP because nuclear block, but good thread.
appuhn.bsky.social Karl Appuhn @appuhn.bsky.social · Dec 31
Every field of historical inquiry fades eventually. And it sucks to be the old guy in the room when it happens to yours. But if you take the longer view (and we are historians after all), concerns that seem dead do come back eventually. Or you can decide that everything is shit now. It's a choice.
December 31, 2025 at 3:57 PM
caperry.bsky.social
Introduction to Oceanography
ladyhistorian.bsky.social Melissa Johnson, PhD @ladyhistorian.bsky.social · Dec 19
In honor of me being mad on the internet, and also needing to feel like other people share my values:

Tell me about the class you didn't want to take in college that ended up bending your mind or being otherwise "useful" in your development as a person
December 19, 2025 at 2:51 AM
Reposted by Craig Perry
uguelphhist.bsky.social
We are hiring! The Department of History at the University of Guelph seeks a tenure-track Assistant Professor in History of the Middle East.

careers.uoguelph.ca/job/Guelph-A...
December 17, 2025 at 7:21 PM
Reposted by Craig Perry
caperry.bsky.social
New book alert! an advance-copy of Slavery and the Jews of Medieval Egypt just arrived. Use the code PUP30 for 30% off. Share with your librarian! Will ship on Jan 20, 2026. www.bit.ly/PerrySlavery
Front cover of the book showing a scene from an illustrated manuscript of “The Dinner Party” by the eleventh-century author Ibn Butlan. Back cover of the book
December 16, 2025 at 2:18 PM
Reposted by Craig Perry
juliajorati.bsky.social
My 2-volume anthology (Slavery in Early Modern Philosophy) is now available on Oxford Academic! Please ask your universities to purchase access. Vol. 1: academic.oup.com/book/61633; Vol. 2: academic.oup.com/book/61775. It should be available in print very soon as well. #philsky #slavery #earlymodern
December 16, 2025 at 8:18 AM
caperry.bsky.social
Congratulations!
amaliasl.bsky.social Amalia S. Levi, PhD @amaliasl.bsky.social · Dec 16
🎉 Today I defended my dissertation and passed with summa cum laude.

The title is "Dependent Lives In and Beyond Archives: Enslaved People in Sephardic Jewish Households in Early Modern Bridgetown, Barbados (1654-1800)."

The abstract is below, and I hope to publish it soon.
December 16, 2025 at 3:04 PM
caperry.bsky.social
New book alert! an advance-copy of Slavery and the Jews of Medieval Egypt just arrived. Use the code PUP30 for 30% off. Share with your librarian! Will ship on Jan 20, 2026. www.bit.ly/PerrySlavery
Front cover of the book showing a scene from an illustrated manuscript of “The Dinner Party” by the eleventh-century author Ibn Butlan. Back cover of the book
December 16, 2025 at 2:18 PM
Reposted by Craig Perry
lollardfish.bsky.social
breathing steadily, calmly. but there are blurbs now.

www.press.jhu.edu/books/title/...
The Public Scholar
A Practical Handbook
www.press.jhu.edu
December 1, 2025 at 5:51 PM
Reposted by Craig Perry
marisakabas.bsky.social
hey the handbasket is 90 paid subscribers away from a huge goal—think we could get there today??

thehandbasket.co/upgrade

🤩🤩🤩🤩🤩🤩🤩🤩🤩🤩
November 28, 2025 at 6:53 PM
Reposted by Craig Perry
johncraighammond.bsky.social
"The Centrality of Slavery" arrived today.
www.pennpress.org/978151282842...
November 26, 2025 at 10:57 PM
Reposted by Craig Perry
caperry.bsky.social
Wonderful experience this week with my students as the Vega String Quartet hosted us in their rehearsal hall and performed music inspired by the history and musical cultures of the Middle East.

Here is a playlist with some of the works they played ... 1/2

open.spotify.com/playlist/5A2...
Music for Introduction to the Middle East recital with the Vega Quartet
open.spotify.com
November 21, 2025 at 2:31 PM
caperry.bsky.social
Maps! From my forthcoming book and created by @greenleejw.bsky.social. I highly recommend JW Greenlee and especially appreciated his collaborative and iterative process of design. These maps capture the geography implicated in the slave trade that I study in the book. There is ... 1/3
Map 1. From Iberia to India, ca. 1000–1250. Map created by John Wyatt Greenlee of Surprised Eel Mapping. Map 2. Egypt and Northeast Africa, ca. 1000–1250. Map created by John Wyatt Greenlee of Surprised Eel Mapping.
November 21, 2025 at 2:41 PM
caperry.bsky.social
Wonderful experience this week with my students as the Vega String Quartet hosted us in their rehearsal hall and performed music inspired by the history and musical cultures of the Middle East.

Here is a playlist with some of the works they played ... 1/2

open.spotify.com/playlist/5A2...
Music for Introduction to the Middle East recital with the Vega Quartet
open.spotify.com
November 21, 2025 at 2:31 PM
Reposted by Craig Perry
caperry.bsky.social
For those who will be at MESA this weekend and next week. I am on a panel about slavery in the medieval Middle East on Sunday at 11am. Abstracts in images and alt text below. Please come join us!
"Perspectives on Slavery in the Medieval Middle East": The study of slavery in the field of early and medieval Islamic history has long lay in the shadows. In recent years, however, its pace has accelerated with the appearance of several key monographs and a series of research articles, notably those that rely on letters and other documents, mainly from second/eighth and third/ninth-century Egypt but also Palestine and Khurasan. This suggests at least an important departure from what appears to have been a long-standing taboo in the field. That same taboo has held up close and detailed study of what was, after all, a significant example in global history of reliance upon slave trading, a slaving economy, and the labor of enslaved and freed persons, particularly in urban settings. Historians of slavery in other fields (eg. medieval Europe and Byzantium) have long acknowledged the significant role of slave trading, for example, in the history of Mediterranean and North-South relations across medieval history. The proposed panel – “Perspectives on Slavery in the Medieval Middle East” – seeks to advance the study of Middle Eastern and Islamic-era slavery while also underscoring the point that the topic is long overdue for sustained scholarship. It is composed of four papers on disparate sub-topics of the history of slavery. The four papers are joined, firstly, by their exploration of underutilized sources, whether written texts that have been largely neglected by modern scholarship; documentary material that offers immediate, on-the-ground insights into characteristics of slave practice in Middle Eastern society; or physical objects (eg. ceramics, coins) that depict enslaved and freed persons in a variety of settings. The papers are also joined by significant questions of how slavery – be it the slave trade, the treatment of enslaved bodies, or the question of social mobility on the part of enslaved and freed persons – have been addressed to the present day... Abstracts for Matthew Gordon's paper "The Tulunid Household and its Unfree Members" and Craig Perry's paper "Modern Memory and the Violence of Medieval Slavery: a View from Nubia." Abstracts for Kristina Richardson's paper "Identifying the Medieval Swahili Slaving Port Town of Qanbalu" and Lamia Balafrej's paper "On Jawari's Mediation: Enslavement, Gender, and the Image in Medieval Islam."
November 19, 2025 at 6:06 PM
caperry.bsky.social
For those who will be at MESA this weekend and next week. I am on a panel about slavery in the medieval Middle East on Sunday at 11am. Abstracts in images and alt text below. Please come join us!
"Perspectives on Slavery in the Medieval Middle East": The study of slavery in the field of early and medieval Islamic history has long lay in the shadows. In recent years, however, its pace has accelerated with the appearance of several key monographs and a series of research articles, notably those that rely on letters and other documents, mainly from second/eighth and third/ninth-century Egypt but also Palestine and Khurasan. This suggests at least an important departure from what appears to have been a long-standing taboo in the field. That same taboo has held up close and detailed study of what was, after all, a significant example in global history of reliance upon slave trading, a slaving economy, and the labor of enslaved and freed persons, particularly in urban settings. Historians of slavery in other fields (eg. medieval Europe and Byzantium) have long acknowledged the significant role of slave trading, for example, in the history of Mediterranean and North-South relations across medieval history. The proposed panel – “Perspectives on Slavery in the Medieval Middle East” – seeks to advance the study of Middle Eastern and Islamic-era slavery while also underscoring the point that the topic is long overdue for sustained scholarship. It is composed of four papers on disparate sub-topics of the history of slavery. The four papers are joined, firstly, by their exploration of underutilized sources, whether written texts that have been largely neglected by modern scholarship; documentary material that offers immediate, on-the-ground insights into characteristics of slave practice in Middle Eastern society; or physical objects (eg. ceramics, coins) that depict enslaved and freed persons in a variety of settings. The papers are also joined by significant questions of how slavery – be it the slave trade, the treatment of enslaved bodies, or the question of social mobility on the part of enslaved and freed persons – have been addressed to the present day... Abstracts for Matthew Gordon's paper "The Tulunid Household and its Unfree Members" and Craig Perry's paper "Modern Memory and the Violence of Medieval Slavery: a View from Nubia." Abstracts for Kristina Richardson's paper "Identifying the Medieval Swahili Slaving Port Town of Qanbalu" and Lamia Balafrej's paper "On Jawari's Mediation: Enslavement, Gender, and the Image in Medieval Islam."
November 19, 2025 at 6:06 PM
Reposted by Craig Perry
caperry.bsky.social
Yay! I just noticed that my book is available for preorder. Use the code PUP30 for 30% off. Share with your librarian! Will ship on Jan 20, 2026 just in time for uhhhhh someone's birthday? Slavery and the Jews of Medieval Egypt | Princeton University Press press.princeton.edu/books/hardco...
Slavery and the Jews of Medieval Egypt
A new global history of the slave trade, the lives of enslaved people, and the role of slavery in the formation of Jewish and Arab-Islamic culture in the medieval Middle East
press.princeton.edu
November 7, 2025 at 3:47 PM